Magazine interview: Mexican druglord fears jail

MEXICO CITY -- One of Mexico's most famous drug lords said in a rare interview published Sunday that he lives in fear of getting caught and believes the military has closed in on him four times.

"I'm terrified of being incarcerated," Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada told the Mexican news magazine, Proceso, adding that he would even contemplate suicide if he was about to be caught. "I'd like to think that yes, I would kill myself."

Zambada and Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, who authorities say control the Sinaloa cartel, are Mexico's two most-notorious fugitives, with a $2 million reward offered for information on their whereabouts.

Zambada offered to meet with Proceso founder Julio Scherer, saying he always wanted to meet the journalist. He gave specific directions on when and where the interview would take place, the publication said.

The magazine offered no other explanation of why a kingpin would give an interview after a lifetime on the run. It is almost unheard for Mexican drug suspects to speak to the media while still free.

The offices of Calderon and the Attorney General said there would be no immediate comment on the interview.

The magazine published the interview along with an outdoor photograph of Scherer with the mustachioed Zambada, who wore a baseball cap that cast a shadow over his eyes and had his arm around the journalist. Only brush can be seen in the background.

Zambada said he had felt the army closing in on him four times and that soldiers had gotten close to Guzman even more often.

"I fled into the countryside. I know the vegetation, the rivers, the rocks, everything," Zambada said. "I'll get caught if I get complacent, careless, just like El Chapo."

But he insisted that the drug trade would continue unabated even if he was arrested.

"When it comes to the capos, jailed, dead or extradited - their replacements are ready," Zambada said.

Guzman, who escaped prison by hiding in a laundry truck nearly a decade ago, has made Forbes magazine's lists of wealthiest and most-powerful people.

"El Chapo Guzman and I are friends and we talk on the phone a lot," Zambada said. He even said he might try to arrange an interview between Guzman and Proceso.

Mexican officials blame the Sinaloa cartel for much of the country's staggering bloodshed. Drug violence has killed more than 18,000 people since President Felipe Calderon took office in 2006, and has made the border city of Ciudad Juarez, where Sinaloa is fighting a turf battle against the Juarez cartel, one of the world's most dangerous cities.

The interview comes as Zambada's son, Jesus Vicente Zambada-Niebla, faces trial in Chicago on charges that he conspired to import and sell large amounts of cocaine and heroin in the United States. Zambada-Niebla, who has pleaded not guilty, was arrested last year in Mexico City and was extradited to the United States in February.

The U.S. indictment accuses both Ismael Zambada and his son of using planes, boats, trucks and cars to move nearly $50 million worth of cocaine from Colombia to New York, New Jersey, Chicago and California between August 2001 and June 2002.

In the interview, Zambada refused to answer questions about his son, saying only that he "cries for him."

In November, a nephew of Zambada, Jesus Zambada Reyes, who had been cooperating with authorities, was found dead in a house in Mexico City in an apparent suicide. Zambada Reyes had been captured in 2008 and accused of smuggling cocaine through Mexico City airports.

Scherer said he and someone sent to accompany him took four cars to a sparsely furnished house where they spent the night. The next evening, he took a long car ride through the mountains until he reached a rustic, two-room house where he met Zambada.

Zambada revealed no details about his alleged criminal activities, but offered some insight into his personal life. He said Zambada-Niebla was the oldest of his five children, and that he has five grandchildren and a great-grandson.